Wayne Rooney must follow example of Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard and leave Manchester United for first-team football
Alan Shearer says the Old Trafford captain must accept time is up at the club after 12 years and should find regular football
THERE are two men who Wayne Rooney knows very well who he can speak to about where his career is at right now.
Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard found themselves in a very similar situation.
Both, like Manchester United superstar Rooney, had been integral to their club’s successes over many years.
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Gerrard spent 17 years at Liverpool and Lampard 13 at Chelsea.
For them, the time came when their clubs no longer needed them and when they were no longer going to be first choice.
They either had to accept it or give up. And they accepted it, however hard that was.
So Gerrard moved on to LA Galaxy and Lampard to Manchester City and New York City.
They just wanted to play football — and that is what their former England team-mate Rooney wants to do.
Believe me, the money and lifestyle is fantastic but footballers just want to be out there on the pitch for as long as they can.
Part of a team, part of a dressing room, important to a club.
Nobody wants to be sat on the bench or up in the stands when they feel fit enough to still play.
For me, Rooney is someone who has to be playing.
He is not an impact sub, a one-game-in-four player, or someone for those League Cup games.
He needs to be out there week in, week out.
It is what drives him on.
Yet it seems that is not going to be the case now at Manchester United.
His days as their out-and-out striker have been gone for some time now.
Marcus Rashford has also said he can play there.
And United’s new boy wonder could also play up front with Zlatan Ibrahimovic in behind him.
So there are so many options for boss Jose Mourinho, who still seems to be grappling with which one is best.
But what is clear is that Rooney is not coming into the equation. Not even playing in a deeper role in front of the back four.
There, they have Ander Herrera, Pogba again and Marouane Fellaini all being swapped around in those roles.
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And let us not forget that Michael Carrick can still do a job there as well.
In many ways Rooney has been left without a clear identity any more.
Much of that is down to his selflessness in playing in various positions to suit whichever manager, simply because he could.
But it has left him master of none, while others have skipped ahead of him.
Maybe now he wishes he had been more ruthless in demanding the role up front that he wanted.
But he has always been a team player.
Not so long ago, he would have picked the ball straight up or had it handed to him.
But he was on the periphery of what was going on during their 4-1 win last Thursday.
As club captain, it is tough to say goodbye to a place where you have enjoyed so much success.
We know how much it means to him to try to break Sir Bobby Charlton’s goalscoring record at United and he will not want to leave until he achieves that.
But if he wants to succeed in his ambition to play in the 2018 World Cup, then he MUST move clubs.
It looks unlikely he can achieve both.
He will not get picked for England if he is not playing regularly.
I doubt he would go to China and and though a move to the MLS seems the most plausible option, it would hinder his international chances.
Outside of maybe boyhood club Everton, how many Premier League sides would want or could afford him?
Rooney has been a brilliant player and, having just turned 31, still has something to offer.
But not by sitting on the bench at Old Trafford.
No player who can still kick a ball wants to be doing that. It is how he then handles life after his glory years at Old Trafford.
I retired at 35 when still part of Newcastle’s first team. I ended where I always wanted to be.
Increasingly it seems it will not be like that for Rooney, and we have seen plenty of examples of players who have left United and found it very tough to adapt elsewhere.
For them, the standards were not the same, nor the players around them.
It is hard but it is something Roo looks like he will have to accept if he wants to continue playing football for the next few years.
And Wayne Rooney still needs to be playing football.
DANNY HIGGINBOTHAM believes Wayne Rooney has NO need to make a hasty decision on his Manchester United future.
The SunSport analyst and former Red Devils defender, 37, said: “Wayne Rooney believes in his own ability.
“He wants to play. He is at his happiest when he is on the pitch and he won’t want to be on the bench for long, especially not at 31.
“The problem for Wayne is that I can’t see Jose Mourinho playing him, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Paul Pogba in the same team because there is the danger of them virtually holding hands in the same part of the pitch.
“But the team is not performing, so it’s not as if they have hit a purple patch since he went out of the team.
“You couldn’t say they have gone to a different level without him.
“If they had he’d be more likely to think the end is near but the team has not stepped up and I’m sure he will be thinking he has a chance to get back in the team.
“I don’t think there is a major incentive for him to leave now.
“It will be different if he gets to the summer and things are the same. Then he might have to go. He will have a year left on his contract and then I’m sure he will address it.”
Manchester-born Higginbotham added: “He doesn’t have to prove anything to anybody and I know he will be playing his captain’s role off the pitch.
“I don’t believe for one minute he will create problems. He will lead by example, even when he is not in the team. He can deal with it.
“I’m sure he will get his opportunities and for anyone to say he’s finished is absolute rubbish.
“Things can change very quickly in football so he has to get his head down and wait for the opportunity to come.
“Who has stood out for United over the past couple of seasons? Probably only two or three players. That tells you everything.
“Wayne is going through a transitional period, finding out about himself and his body.
"He doesn’t have the same attributes he had four or five years ago and he has to reinvent himself, like David Beckham and Ryan Giggs did.”